Tales of Heartbreak
Later this month Ireland will hold a referendum on whether to liberalise its abortion laws. It’s a touchy subject and one many people have very strong opinions on. In the run-up, an Irish friend on Facebook shared a page called In Her Shoes – Women of the Eighth. The name refers to the 1983 amendment to the Irish Constitution which virtually outlawed abortion, and the stories shared there are of women who’ve faced the heartbreaking decision to travel to the UK to terminate unwanted pregnancies or, worse, have undergone illegal procedures elsewhere. It’s a stark reminder that, in these supposedly enlightened days, this is still a hugely contentious issue. For some, it’s black and white but these stories illustrate that it’s anything but. I wish everyone would take a look before making up their mind.
Congrats to May
It was lovely to hear that May AlHaji had managed to complete the Boston Marathon. The super-fit Bahraini graced our pages earlier this year when she qualified for both London and Boston. And she told me she’d actually come to running and triathlon in 2012, after many years playing tennis. Her words were: “It’s never too late to start.” Pretty inspirational for those of us who keep promising to get fit, but haven’t quite got there yet.
Why So Long?
I listened to an interview on the radio the other day with Dr Mae Jemison, who became the first African American woman to travel into space on the Space Shuttle Endeavour in September 1992. The chat was interesting and her achievements have long been celebrated, but one statement that truly struck home with me was that it took too long. Dr Jemison said there were qualified black Americans and women long before 1992, and that’s an issue that still reverberates. It particularly came to mind when I read a news story that, for the first time, a woman’s statue has been unveiled in London’s Parliament Square. Suffragette Millicent Fawcett joins the ranks of the great and the good, alongside 11 men! The move came after an online campaign and the unveiling was attended by Prime Minister Theresa May. Of course, it’s cause for celebration, but, really, why so long?
To the Frozen North
Women from Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Cyprus were part of an all-female, Euro-Arabian team which recently undertook a seven-day cross-country ski, over 82km, to reach the North Pole. In doing so, each became the first person from her country to complete the journey. The expedition was organised by British polar explorer Felicity Aston as part of a bid to build dialogue between Western and Arab cultures. There’s no doubt it’s a great achievement for the individual women but, it seems to me, this must have been an extremely costly exercise and I reckon the money could have been better spent ‘building dialogue’ on the ground in the Middle East.
On Their Bikes
Yes, it’s another first for the magic kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which has seen its first women’s cycling race. Organiser Nadima Abu al-Enein, who set up a cycling group through social media in 2017, said her committee, which is working together with local authorities, had expected 30 participants but that increased to 47 when extra people turned up and, sadly, some women were turned away when the numbers got too large. The event prompted lots of comment on Twitter, some supportive, some not. To me, it seems like cause for celebration – not only are women breaking yet more barriers, they’re getting fit at the same time.
